Area prepares application to make train from Scranton to NYC.
Scranton, Lackawanna Co. — The dream of a train from Scranton to New York City has a chance to become a reality with the Bipartisan Infrastructure Bill from the Department of Transportation.
“PENNDOT, the state of New Jersey, New Jersey Transit, the railroad authority. And all of the counties: Lackawanna County, Monroe County, Warren and Sussex counties over in New Jersey. We’ve all worked together over all these years to come to this point and finally get the financing," said Larry Malksi, President of the PA Northeast Regional Railroad authority.
Malksi said all these organization are applying together to get grant money through the federal bipartisan infrastructure bill to make the train from Scranton to NYC happen.
The application is due in 11 days and Malksi got help from Amtrak.
“(We) contracted Amtrak 2 years ago to do an operating analysis of our corridor, of our passenger corridor," said Malski. "Which will be completed next week.”
The analysis will include costs and Amtrak already predicts the train would bring 450,000 riders a year.
This map shows what the route would look like.
The application will also have signatures which the Scranton Rail Restoration Coalition has been gathering for about 4 years.
They currently have 10,050 signatures.
“Honestly, if you ever looked through a stack of 10,000 names, you know it’s really a lot of paper and it demonstrates the massive amount of public support that this project enjoys," said Tyler Kusma, Executive Director.
They don’t know when the plans will be submitted but are still collecting signatures.
Malksi said they are confident in the work put into the application.
“We think we’ve done our homework and we think we’re going to have a very good application," said Malksi.
Malski tells me that the proposed train station would start at the Intermodal Center in Scranton and run about 3 trains a day.
Congressman Cartwright is expected to speak about this tomorrow.
